Enola Yarn – blogpost 43

After a long rest at Zox’s palace, we tell the story about the Smokeymera to Zox in the morning. He informs us that the glyphs are the work of the Lich – Arcturia, but she’s not always present. 

“I BEG YOUR PARDON?! A LICH?!” exclaims Calyx.

“Yeah, she sets the polymorph traps,” explains Zox. “The glyphs.” he sighs. “You have to be careful with those, she experiments a lot with them. Better watch out.”

To deal with the glyphs, Valentine and Calyx will take turns in detecting magic to avoid them. Farryn says he’s going to make a wand for detecting magic, and that – if it isn’t that much trouble, we would like to go back to Waterdeep in a few days to study his Tome of Clear Thoughts. We agree, and start walking to the next level. However, Farryn only wants to descend when the mechanical worm has gone up again. So we wait a bit.

When we’ve gone through the tunnel, we see the big doors again. Previously, Valentine used her magic to get all enemies under her control, but we see a couple of hobgoblins that weren’t there for it. We agree to get rid of them so we can pass through. Calyx kills almost all of them with one big well-aimed flame. 

Passing a statue of Arcturia (lich-form), Valentine asks a question to Calyx – out of nowhere: “Liches are bad, right? So we should kill it?”

“Um, yeah, guess so.”

When Farryn stops for a second to investigate something, I make sure to walk in the middle of Calyx and Valentine. 

A couple of minutes later, we pass another statue – Hallaster this time. The statue has eyes and they look every which way. Farryn touches the statue, and we hear a click. When we look down, we find two keys. They are made of Mithrill and there are letters on them. One with an ‘F’, and one with ‘V’. 

“Ah! Farryn, and Valentine!” says Calyx.

“That would be weird…” Farryn takes the keys. 

“I can hold them!” offers Calyx.

“No. No, give them to Farryn,” says Valentine.

We explore further, avoiding voices and chants that sound like a training/practice fight, ending up in a room with sarcophagi. Calyx feels a strange kind of magic but still wants to approach and investigate. 

“Yeah. REALLY smart.” scoffs Valentine passive-aggressively. 

Calyx still wants to approach one sarcophagus. As a response, I conjure a fire elemental. 

At that point, Calyx is interested. He asks the name of the elemental, and I quickly respond: “John.” 

Farryn asks: “Hey, Enola. Why did you conjure the elemental?”

“Well,” I say dryly. “I expected shit to go down.”

“Ah, okay. Nice!” Farryn walks over to the room and starts investigating the tombs. I slap myself in the face out of exasperation. Ugh. Why does this gnome ALWAYS want to find loot and treasure? Absent-mindedly, I command the elemental to approach the last sarcophagus. Then… It starts to change.

Shit! The weird magic Calyx felt must have been on the last tomb in the corner! What kind of magic it is, is now clear to me: my elemental is transforming into a Wyvern. I need to drop my concentration on the elemental before the Wyvern starts attacking. “HIT ME!” I shout to Valentine. 

Without questioning me, Valentine strikes me across the face – hard. The Wyvern polymorph bursts, and it is silent. Farryn didn’t even notice and is still opening up chests. Of course.

Finished with the sarcophagi-filled room, we scout the area. However, our activities have to wait a bit, because we hear big footsteps. To get away quickly, Valentine kills some hobgoblins guarding a door, and we go through. After a couple of turns, other chambers, and some late-hobgoblins, we run to the south – away from the big, threatening footsteps.

Valentine runs in front of the party and almost runs into a mushroom. At first, I think she is yelling because she thinks it’s disgusting, but then, I realize the mushroom ITSELF is shouting as its life depends on it. The door on our right opens and an angry-looking hobgoblin sees us. He starts to attack the nearest target: Grond.

Quickly, we’re closed in by hobgoblins, and there are many of them. I get attacked but suddenly, a weird tentacled creature saves me. “Hello! Watch out!” it says to me with a low but tiny voice. “I’m Flumph the Flumph!”

I help the party to get rid of the hobgoblins, but the real hero must be Farryn – he slices the head of the first (boss) hobgoblin clean off. After the massacre, we ask Flumph some questions. 

I know Flumphs are mysterious creatures that originate from the Underdark. He introduces himself again to the party: “Hello! I’m Flumph the Flumph!”

“Ohh, Farryn! Let’s report this to the guild!” says Calyx excitedly.

“What are you doing here?” asks Farryn.

“I’m here!” says Flumph.

“Okay, umm, how did you get here?”

“Well, the guild I was with, is dead. I was with the assistant of Arcturia, a mind flayer.” 

“Is he nice?” asks Valentine.

“No.”

“Good to know.”

“Why were all these hobgoblins here?”

“They were building a house for me. But they’re not nice. I want to go to the Underdark again.”

“Why did you help me, Flumph?” I ask.

“You guys are not not nice.”

Farryn is still talking to Flumph, and I take my chances in finding loot. I open a chest near us and find a lot of treasure: 2,500 gp, an electrum pepper shaker (25 gp), a pewter candlestick (25 gp), a red velvet cape (50 gp), an ornate coral statuette of a ship cresting a wave (250 gp), a dwarven beard comb made of lapis lazuli and set with gemstones (750 gp), a platinum crown with black pearl inlay (2,500 gp), and an elven helm made of leafed gold with a spiral horn of amethyst protruding from its brow (7,500 gp). I put it all in the bag of holding.

Farryn opens the door on the other side of the room and we barricade the door where we entered the room. We hear other hobgoblins pushing the door immediately after we’ve barricaded it. It wasn’t enough, but Valentine and I attack them until dead.

In the next room, we find big pillars with blinking eyes. The eyes focus on adventurers who come closer. Between those pillars, are two huge doors. Valentine uses her ability to look through walls to conclude that there are stairs to the next level behind the door. 

“The next level is from Emberosa,” says Flumph. 

Valentine tries to open the door, but it is stuck. Nevertheless, we find a secret room. 

“Emberosa is a giant that builds a mechanical creature for Hallaster…” 

“I want to see that!” says Farryn. 

“Okay, later. First, let’s see this secret room!” says Valentine.

We see a golden door. When we enter, we see a beautiful foom with something lying in a hammock. It greets us with a velvet voice: “Hello…” 

“Hello, who are you?” 

“I’m Allussiarr, welcome.” 

This is not a normal human. “Can you show us your true self?” 

“Yes. Of course.” it steps out of the hammock and walks towards us. It is a Rakshasha. He tells us he really wants to go outside and needs our help to do it. He has something in return for us. To talk it over, we go outside. I know that Rakshasha are evil and charismatic. Allussiarr is not to be trusted, so we decide to leave him.

We discuss what to do next. Farryn wants to know what kind of constructs are being made and then go down. Valentine is frustrated and urges us to first go down one level. Calyx sides with Farryn, and I’m indifferent. So, most votes count: we explore a bit more on this level. We open a door and enter a pantry.

Then, we hear again big footsteps. Damn… We walk away to the door where Emberosa is situated, according to Flumph. To check if Emberosa is really in the room, Calyx transforms into a spider to crawl into the room without being noticed.

When Calyx returns, we head back to the pantry, to think of a plan. Emberosa looked very mighty, and the mechanical construct that he was building, was ginormous…